Posted By gsteen - March 15, 2012
In 2009, Foursquare exploded onto the tech scene after it made waves at SXSW by providing attendees a fun and useful way to coordinate with friends as they bounced from place to place in downtown Austin.
This spawned a fascination with location-based services (LBS) that saturated the industry for the following couple of years. After seeing countless LBS start-ups make their way into the spotlight, most people in the marketing, advertising and
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Posted By gsteen - February 28, 2012
170,389 people checked into the Oscars Sunday, a new record for entertainment check-ins. The awards show almost doubled the second place finisher for the week, which was “The Big Bang Theory.”
This is in addition to the recent inclusion of GetGlue in ads for new TV shows, which is another strong sign that the app has entered the spotlight. Our discussion of Interactive TV from a few weeks ago looked at
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Posted By gsteen - February 23, 2012
People spend 23% of their time consuming media on their smartphones and other mobile devices.
But advertisers spend only 1% of their money in mobile media.
Something is wrong here. Very wrong.
The Next Big Thing
There are 106 million smartphone users in the US and even more feature phone users. The category is growing rapidly and analysts expect mobile advertising spend to reach $10 billion by 2016, but right now the medium is
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Posted By gsteen - January 24, 2012
Over the past 20 years broadband internet has fundamentally changed the world and the way we live within it. How we work, buy things, communicate with our friends and more is drastically different than it was before this technological shift.
Mobile devices will drive similarly significant change over the next decade
How, you ask?
Four words: Location, gaming, payment and search.
Location-aware Applications
The ability of mobile devices to detect location provides the opportunity to
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Posted By gsteen - January 10, 2012
New media platforms demand new formats for content:
The printing press gave rise to the widespread distribution of books and newspapers. Radio bred panel discussions and radio dramas. The television encouraged the growth of half-hour video entertainment in a world previously dominated by feature-length films.
The most recent iteration of this is tablets and smartphones encouraging short-form entertainment such as web video and podcasts.
The Casualization of Content
One of the hallmarks of mobile
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Posted By eknab - September 1, 2011
Talk and TV typically don't mix. When friends sit down to watch the latest episode of a show, they aren't interested to hear about what others had for lunch or the latest gossip. This is because watching standard television is a one-way communication, only allowing characters in shows and spokespeople in commercials to do the talking. Viewers are viewers and nothing more.
Digital is giving people a reason to speak up
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Posted By gsteen - July 27, 2011
A man walks up to the cash register and taps his phone on a pad that is sitting on the counter. Then he walks out of the store carrying a giant bag stuffed with new clothes without handing over any cash or using a credit card.
Technologists have predicted for years that we would all begin using our phones as credit cards, losing the plastic and simply waving our devices when
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Posted By eknab - June 29, 2011
PacSun has created a native mobile application that allows users to browse products from multiple brands using a sleek navigation. What sets it apart is the 15% discount users receive after simply downloading the app. Additionally, in the "Create a Look" section, users can tailor an entire ensemble, including hat, shoes and other accessories, to share with friends and purchase.
Implications: The "Create a Look" section allows for customization added to
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Posted By gsteen - June 23, 2011
In the olden days, advertising campaigns had a digital arm and a traditional arm. The TV spot would be akin to a short skit while the banner ads would replicate the idea with 100,000 pixels or so. The tightest integration would occur on the campaign microsite, where the TV spot could be viewed in a browser. Yes, the advertising industry was vastly different in 2006.
Today, traditional and digital advertising bleed
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Posted By gsteen - June 15, 2011
P&G’s Beauty and Grooming division recently released My Beauty Adviser, a mobile application that gives users a consultation to determine what products are best suited to help them improve their look. The consultation consists of multiple choice quizzes that ask users to identify their goals along with the type of skin and hair they have. Users can also read product reviews and access My Beauty Adviser Magazine, which offers exclusive
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